Fear
by I Believe and Dream
Summary: There are two basic motivating forces: Fear and Love. When we are afraid, we pull back from life. When we are in love, we open to all that life has to offer with passion, excitement, and acceptance. Sadly, he never experienced that Love. But Fear... Fear was his old friend. I don't own Avengers. One shot, T rated, part of the 'World Behind Their Walls' series.


Fear is what makes him safe.

It keeps him careful, always on his toes. It makes him sure he'll survive another hour, another day, another week.

It soon became the big part of his life.

He was always on the move, running from the ones that wanted him caged, wanted him locked away. He ran from S.H.I.E.L.D., from his family, his friends... From humans in general.

Town after town, village after village, he found himself running away from the world. He tried to escape the reality only to be greeted with more suffering in his mind. He could never find real peace with all that burning guilt in his heart and the amount of blood on his hands.

Before he knew it, he was running from the life, and somehow it seemed right.

It made him feel safe, but still miserable.

So the only way out of all that misery was work.

He would mask the pain and the always present guilt with endless work. He would exhaust himself with many hours of work, tries to find the cure for some decease or simply treating the patience over and over again.

And in the end of the day, when he can't stand on his feet or even think straight, he would fall into the darkness without dreams, and it was a blessing.

The only light at the end of his tunnel.

Every day spent like that soon became a routine.

Waking up, doing his job, trying to help the poor ones as much as he can, and then drifting into the darkness with nothing waiting for him there.

Then again, sometimes he was greeted with nightmares.

Nightmares that would make even the toughest man scream in fear, begging for the end to come, to finish that misery.

Nightmares filled with blood, pain, screams... Death.

That's why he considered himself happy when he had no dreams.

No dreams, no nightmares, just nothing.

You may not understand that, but those were his only blissful moments.

But don't feel bad for him, because he was used to it! He embraced it as his life, his punishment, and he dealt with it well, according to himself.

Until _they _came and ruined him over again.

_One _person was enough to break the so-called peace he had, and not carrying about his feelings or will, threw him over the edge and into the stressful environment.

She showed up in the middle of India, paid a little girl to drag him out and then appeared in front of him with a calm expression and a lame excuse.

_The world needs you._

To Banner it all seemed ridiculous.

Why would 'the world' need a beast, a monster, a poor soul that can't even save himself?

Why would they need someone like him?

But again, in the other part of Bruce's brain was a tiny voice who whispered 'what if this is the God's way of giving you the other chance?'

Chance to redeem himself, to do something that might remove the part of that guilt in his heart?

What if that was a test?

Or maybe it was a one way ticket to death and chaos?

... Too many 'ifs'.

Again, who is he to decide? He can only choose to try and maybe even die trying to change something, or to not even try and live the same, dull life with no excitement or happiness.

It can't be called a real life, can it?

...

And there he was, staring at the red haired agent with his eyes shifting around, pointing every single S.H.I.E.L.D. agent that came to catch him.

He knew that they were there since the first second she showed up, and he just confirmed the doubts as he reached for her, raising his voice in progress.

And she reached for her gun.

The faint, stabbing pain in his chest appeared as he realized that no matter how much they needed him, they still weren't ready to trust him completely.

But then again, he never really hoped they would. It was again that _fear_ that he was so familiar with.

With that, he made up his mind.

_Okay._

One word, four letter.

A word that showed his indifference, his not-carrying. His emotionless mask. He honestly didn't care for the world. No matter how good person he was, he was sure that the world would be fine without him.

And the only reason for him to agree to help was the fact that no matter what he does, S.H.I.E.L.D. will hunt him down and bring him to them.

He simply knew that.

Because fear is what makes them react, makes them want to save their lives and remove themselves from the danger.

It was then when he realized that fear is all he got.

_Fear of his other side._


End file.
